Re-examining the Business Case for Employee Recognition

Doing More with Less:
Re-examining the Business
Case for Employee Recognition
Susan Brown, Siemens Corp
Mike Ryan, Madison Performance Group
What we will talk about...

Why employee recognition is even more relevant today

How to broaden your business case

How to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of recognition
Mike Ryan
SVP, Marketing & Strategy
President Emeritus
Board Member
Executive Committee
About Madison…

Workforce Recognition

Sales Incentives

Elevating the conversation

www.madisonpg.com

Client focused design process

Advanced & flexible
technology

Serve leading global brands
Susan Brown
Senior Director, Compensation

7 years at Siemens

Key accomplishments

Career platform: Unified 15+ entities

Increase efficiency: Salary planning
and incentives

Recognize and empower: reward &
recognition platform
Why does employee recognition matter?

When unemployment is stubbornly high?

When productivity levels are off the charts?

Because good people will always have options

Current workloads are not sustainable

Fear is not a motivator....recognition & brand alignment are
How did we get there?

Jobs slashed…footprints increased

66% of workers putting in unpaid overtime

63% say employers do not appreciate the effort

Job stacking syndrome...”overemployed”

Majority say workloads are not sustainable

Top producers among the most “frustrated”
Recognition is still a retention strategy

74% of employees would consider a new job opportunity

21% have applied for a new job in the last six months

40% of all key leadership employees are eyeing new positions

25% of all “high potentials” are at risk for voluntary separation
What employees really want...
Trends in Global Employee Engagement, Aon Hewitt, 2011
...they help focus employees on brand values
Responsible
Excellent
Innovative
Efficiency & effectiveness starts with managers...
“Strong correlation”
“Very strong correlation”
Treats employee like individual
Encourages use of talents
Provides regular feedback
Recognizes and rewards
achievements
Employee Engagement Report 2011, Blessing White Jan 2011
The broader business case for recognition...

The “integrated” brand and its impact on culture and values

Uncover and commercialize best practices

Collaboration across virtual work teams
Doing More with Less

Effectiveness

Efficiency
How Siemens looked at recognition:
About Siemens AG

Headquartered in Munich,
Germany

Employs 405,000 people
worldwide

Sales of $103 Billion
“For over 160 years, Siemens has stood for
technological excellence, innovation, quality, reliability
and internationality” – Siemens AG press website
How Siemens looked at recognition:
About Siemens US

Biggest contributor to
revenue and margin outside
Germany

9 worldwide businesses
based in US, 760 locations

Employ >60,000 people
Regions
Regions
How Siemens looked at recognition:
Organizational structure
Our external campaign
Siemens Answers…
And in TV ads:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-npKPxW3tdI&feature=endscreen&NR=1
Our recognition tool – landing page
Our recognition tool – easy view of history
How Siemens looked at recognition:
Where we came from ….
Recognition programs varied in form and function

Mechanisms

Criteria

Approval processes

Funding rates

Award currency

Platforms
How Siemens looked at recognition:
… and how far we had to go

Streamline and control expenses

But at the same time do more with recognition as an asset…

Motivate, unite, and engage a diverse workforce

Bring consistency to the units’ disparate approaches to
recognition

Give Human Resources better insight and oversight

Allow Finance to tightly track
Getting to the solution:
The Business Case wasn’t just about $$
Lack of Financial Control


Unknown Spend
Inconsistent Issuance
Risk

Inconsistent processing
and taxation
Inefficiency



Resource duplication
Inconsistent/manual
processes
Approval burdens
Opportunity to
re-build a strong
program ….
Appropriate use of
$
Getting the
maximum impact
of $
Getting to the solution:
Our 4Cs defined our objectives
 Compliance
 Control
 Consistency
 Context
Getting to the solution:
Custom or Pre-set?


Philosophical Selection criteria:

Ability to unite our multiple entities

Embrace our values and key results areas

Help managers reward & empower employees
System Selection criteria:

A solution spanning our unique needs

Implementation; both time and effort

Cost/value
Impact: Making it effective
The right employee behaviors
Innovation


Streetcar
delivery leads to
multi-million $
contract
Re-design a
plant system
layout to reduce
the number of
conveyors
Collaboration

“Thanks to the 5
of you who
volunteered to
assist with
coverage in
Alaska during a
critical
situation…”
Customer

“Your customers
rave about you
and your
attitude”…“you
protect and
improve
Siemens’ image.”
Impact: Making it effective
The right employee behaviors
Making it effective:
Impact of 20k awards on the company
“ YA g i v e s u s a c o m m o n w a y
to reward efforts across a
group of employees”
“I t’s a g reat p ro g ram – yo u
can say ‘good work’ but the
program really reinforces it
– a real morale lifter”
2011 Engagement score: 93% (+3%)
2011 Retention score: 71% (+5%)
…. With efficient systems
…. 3 clicks and you are done
How we do this efficiently

Rigorous discovery yields a “simple” efficient tool

Seamless and intuitive for managers

Coaching text adds to system/process support

Immediate and regular recognition

“Efficient” and “effective” impact on employee
Connecting recognition to the brand promise

“You Answered” to complement
Siemens external marketing
campaign

We connected the theme and
award currency

We reinforced that our
employees provide the
answers…
If you’re going to do this

Get the right level of executive sponsorship

Think about the different needs of different constituencies


Managers - intuitive, efficient

Finance – transparency

Employees – context
Build it for tomorrow – and implement today!
Susan Brown, Siemens Corp
Mike Ryan, Madison Performance Group